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Opinion Contributor

Grand bargain requirements

After the election, it's still possible for a grand bargain in Congress, author says. | AP Photo

By BART STUPAK | 11/4/12 9:10 PM EST
Updated: 11/8/12 3:55 PM EST

While voters are focused on the presidential election, some conscientious policy leaders have been contemplating different scenarios for addressing our current economic crisis. Regardless of who wins the presidency and which party controls Congress, America is on an unsustainable economic path. There is a great deal of discussion in Washington surrounding a “grand bargain” in an effort to avoid the fiscal cliff and address our national debt. Any agreement to tackle the nation’s fiscal woes would require Democrats to agree on spending cuts and Republicans to agree on tax increases for the wealthiest members of our society. I sincerely urge our leaders to support an agreement that is both fair and equitable. The agreement must ensure that no one segment of our society bears a disproportionate burden of spending cuts or tax increases.

As leaders address proposals to rebuild and reinvigorate the economy, those proposals must include significant segments in regard to energy consumption and our environmental footprint. Our leaders must reach consensus on a grand bargain to solidify our nation’s energy and economic policies. With a grand bargain on energy, Democrats must agree to greater domestic production of fossil fuels. Republicans must agree to accept increased national investment in renewable fuels and smart energy technologies. Democrats must also accept that our largest energy companies are not considered the enemy, and Republicans must agree that reducing our dependence on fossil fuels is a national security priority. Each party needs to acknowledge that its current energy policy contains both advantages and limitations.

We need to be able to work together. While it is important to stand by your principles, politicians have to be able to make compromises. This country has become too divided. There is a need to forgive, to understand, to listen to the other side and give and take. Jesus said, ". . . Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand" Matthew 12:25. It is my prayer that this election will bring an end to political divisiveness, and our leaders will begin to work together for the good of all.

We need to be able to work together. While it is important to stand by your principles, politicians have to be able to make compromises. This country has become too divided. There is a need to forgive, to understand, to listen to the other side and give and take. Jesus said, ". . . Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand" Matthew 12:25. It is my prayer that this election will bring an end to political divisiveness, and our leaders will begin to work together for the good of all.

I disagree with you. But honestly, that doesn't matter. The past is over. Our nation has numerous problems to solve, and the obscene polarization going on these days is killing us. Nothing will get solved, ever, unless both sides compromise a little.

A solution to the fiscal crisis, for example, will - with certainty - require both spending cuts and revenue generation. There's no feasible way around that.

Whadya say? Can we agree on that and other things? Or will it be war til all of us are dead?

The repubes are already threatening to stop any deal that includes any tax increase. Let the sequester pass. Stay on the current energy path. Don't allow foreign pipelines on our soil. Stop unregulated fracking. No drilling in sensitive areas. If the Koch brothers want to sell unlimited coal, let them, but make them supply the equipment to eliminate or trap all poisons resulting from burning that coal and restore back to original the areas they mine. They can afford it.

When I saw the headline of this article I thought it was about the bargain that would save us from the "fiscal cliff." Instead it is a grand bargain about energy policy. I agree with everything the author proposes, however, I also think it would take a National Unity government of Obama and Romney being co-presidents and technocrats running the country. Something like what exists in Italy today. I would not want that here. What is proposed is not democracy. In our democracy,the two parties duke it out in the elections and the winner gets to try to implement their vision of the country. Compromises are required only to get legislation through Congress. I find this whole "grand bargain" concept that is fair to everyone somewhat unrealistic.

Seigniorage and the Irrelevance of the Debt Limit http://my.firedoglake.com/...

The two great powers of a sovereign state are the monopoly of violence and seigniorage, the profits from the creation of money. If the federal deficit (that is, expenditures in excess of tax receipts) were funded by seigniorage revenue, not only would there be no debt service owed on the money, there’d actually be no deficit.

Seigniorage (whether generated by the Federal Reserve or by the US Mint) is supposed to be booked by Treasury as “miscellaneous receipts”, since the funds can be appropriated for other govt uses, it actually reduces the deficit dollar for dollar.

If, in fact, Mint seigniorage is legally indistinguishable from Fed seigniorage as miscellaneous receipts revenue, it does offer an escape hatch (or more like a subway tunnel really) if Congress refuses to increase the statutory debt limit. The Secretary has rather broad authority to mint coins, Congress was apparently feeling generous when it authorized platinum coins in 31 USC 5112(k) (“with such specifications, designs, varieties, quantities, denominations, and inscriptions as the Secretary, in the Secretary’s discretion, may prescribe…”).

If deficit spending was paid for (eliminated actually) with miscellaneous receipts revenue generated by selling the Fed jumbo denomination coins, and since the Federal Fund Rate can now be pegged with Interest on Reserve payments in lieu of selling Treasuries to drain excess reserves, Tsy could fund govt operations indefinitely without ever raising the statutory debt limit.

But here is the point: If our nation can issue a dollar bond, it can issue a dollar bill. The element that makes the bond good makes the bill good... If the Government issues bonds, the brokers will sell them. The bonds will be negotiable; they will be considered as gilt edged paper. Why? Because the government is behind them, but who is behind the Government?

The people.

Therefore it is the people who constitute the basis of Government credit. Why then cannot the people have the benefit of their own gilt-edged credit by receiving non-interest bearing currency… instead of the bankers receiving the benefit of the people’s credit in interest-bearing bonds?”

Thomas Edison, quoted in NY Times, Dec. 6, 1921

http://prosperityuk.com...

If you think about it, it does seem odd that the US Government is the monopoly supplier of US dollars and yet our politicians go through life thinking the government will run out of money unless it can borrow more.

Of course that’s not true, the coins in your pocket are legal tender and yet were not issued against debt. They’re minted by the US Government, backed only by the gilt-edged credit of the American people, no one is paid interest on them and they don’t add a penny to the statutory debt.

What’s more, the use of coins as legal tender is scalable, they could replace the use of Tsy debt sales. No, you wouldn’t have to carry more coins in your pocket. Nothing would change except Tsy would be credited by the Federal Reserve for the sale of interest-free Treasury coins (presumably of large denominations two or three $10 trillion coins) instead of interest-bearing Treasury bonds.

Looking into it, I found that while Federal Reserve profits are counted as a revenue source (larger than estate taxes and customs duties combined), US Mint profits are not. Source: beuwolf www.firedoglake.www

Cut military spending that we don't need, nor have Joint Chiefs of Staff asked for. Then, let the Bush tax cuts expire and we will be good to go. Not sure how we got to the point of the middle class subsidizing the rich and spending ridiculous amounts on defense contracts, but we can do without both.